At the considerable risk of boring some people here, I'm going to put up
my notes on Griffin's book. Comments appreciated, particularly when you
seeing me go way off base.
Notes on RELIGION & SCIENTIFIC NATURALISM by David Ray Griffin
by John Burgeson, Denver, Colorado, May 2001
1. Notes on the Series Introduction (5 pages)
First of all, although I've read Whitehead's 1925 lectures, upon which
his philosophy (Whiteheadism) is based, I came away from that reading
with a sense that I have not been able to "get into his head" and really
understand his point of view. Griffin, writing 75 years later, is much
clearer. Still, Griffin is also a difficult read, and I probably do not
do him justice in these notes.
Both Whitehead's 1925 lectures and Griffin's book were part of a Ph.D.
level course taught at the Iliff School of Theology in the spring quarter
of 2001 by William Dean, one time associate of Paul Tillich. We also
studied Bultmann, Berger and McFague. The course, Science, Theology and
Religion, tried to get us (the students) to understand the thinking of
these five persons, not necessarily to buy into any of their outlooks. I
was an auditor of the course.
Both Whitehead and Griffin appear to see a middle ground between
materialism and supernaturalism. It is the "fallacy of the excluded
middle" that they assert is operative in persons seeing only the two
possibilities. Of course, from my perspective going in, I quickly
identified the possible "fallacy of the nonexisting middle" as an
alternative.
Whitehead wrote, in 1925, that the chief goal of philosophy is to bring
the "scientific community" and the "religious community" together into a
world view adequate for both their interests. Such a view is generally
identified as "theistic naturalism." One question of interest to me is
whether this strange phrase is oxy moronic or has some validity.
Two terms appear, and reappear, so frequently that they need definition.
The first is "modernity," which dates as far back (one source) as 1450
but more often is taken to cover the later part of the 19th century and
most of the 20th century. The second, "post modern," first appeared in
1944 and is descriptive of thought today. Griffin's book is part of a
"SUNY series in Postmodern Thought." Griffin identifies two post
modernism positions;
(1) Deconstructive, which generally eliminates such concepts "such as
self, purpose, meaning, a real world, givenness, reason, truth as
correspondence, universally valid norms and divinity." (pg x). It carries
the premises of the sensationist doctrine of perception, the mechanistic
doctrine of nature and the denial of divine world presence to their
logical conclusions. Griffin observes that such a position leads to
self-referential inconsistencies, such as "performative
self-contradictions." As the book goes on, he occasionally pauses to
throw a stone or two at this position, but his thesis is on a second
position:
(2) Reconstructive, which seeks to overcome the modern worldview by a
revision of its premises and concepts. While critical of some ideas
popularly associated with modern science, it rejects only "scientism,"
that is, that position in which only the data and theories of modern
natural science can have a say in a worldview. In particular, it holds a
"positive meaning" for selfhood, meaning, reason, truth, divinity, etc.
In particular, it accepts non-sensory perception, by which Griffin means
to include not only encounters with the divine but also (possibly at
least) parapsychological events.
End notes on the Series Introduction
Burgy (John Burgeson)
www.burgy.50megs.com
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